While Greece is hoping for a record tourist year and 17 million visitors, it didn’t get off to a good start in the first quarter, with a decline of 1.5 percent in arrivals compared to the same period in 2012, a year which turned out to be a big disappointment.
Data from the Bank of Greece showed the first quarter dropoff, which indicted the biggest fall was in visitors from Europe, while there was an increase in those from other parts of the world. The January-April period is not high season in Greece.
The number of tourists who visited Greece the first four months of 2013 reached 1,581,000, compared to 1,604,000 in the first quarter of last year. Arrivals from EU countries dropped by 8.7 percent, while arrivals from other countries rose by 8 percent.
Revenues from tourism industry recorded a fall of 7.9 percent, compared to the correspondent period in 2012. This is due to the fact that revenues coming from EU countries were reduced by 21.7 percent and reached 349 million euros. Revenues coming from visitors from other countries from January to April 2013, present a rise of 13 percent compared to the same period in 2012.
However, the travel balance in the end of April 2013 presented an increased surplus by 42 million euros compared to last year, reaching 227 million euros. This is due to the bigger drop in travel payments, by 100 million euros or 18 percent compared to the period January-April 2012, compared to the drop of travel revenues from 58 million euros to 7.9 percent.
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